In surgery, it is essential that the region in and around the incision be brightly illuminated. Conventional lighting includes the usual lighting fixtures within the operating room and a lamp on the surgeon's headgear.
It is also known to provide a fiberoptic illuminator which is attachable to a certain specific instrument. For example, it is known to provide an illuminator of this type for a dental handpiece as shown in Hutchinson U.S. Pat. No. 3,634,938, Gores U.S. Pat. No. 3,614,414 and Sadowski U.S. Pat. No. 3,590,232. It is also known to attach an illuminator, including a power pack, to a surgical retractor as shown in Ostensen U.S. Pat. No. 3,592,199.
One problem common to all of these illuminators is that each of them is adapted for attachment to only one particular instrument, such as a dental handpiece, or to a particular surgical retractor. Accordingly, if it were desired to provide an illuminator for several different instruments in the operating room, it would be necessary to have a different illuminator for each different surgical instrument.
The prior art illuminators are subject to various other disadvantages. For example, some require that relatively heavy or bulky components of the illuminator be mounted on the surgical instrument. Other prior art illuminators have one or more components that tend to obstruct the line of sight of the user.